Overcoming Anger: How to Identify It, Stop It, and Live a Healthier Life

by Carol D Jones

Overview

Overcoming Anger helps you identify the roots of your anger and get it under control once and for all. Using cutting-edge techniques combined with a conversational approach, author Carol D. Jones, Ph.D., M.F.T., helps you turn your gaze inward and understand your individual anger style.
You'll also develop a framework for managing your anger, and techniques for eliminating it altogether, such as:

• identifying your personal anger style and developing a plan
• making a commitment to change your life
• coping with everyday triggers to eliminate stress
• developing positive communication techniques
• listening actively rather than passively
• creating a personal responsibility assessment for your thoughts and actions
• and so much more

Overcoming Anger provides you with quizzes, checklists, and mediations designed to help you wipe out anger at its core. With these techniques, you'll finally be able to let go of your anger and live a happy and fulfilling life!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781440519185
Publisher:	Adams Media
Publication date:	01/01/2004
Sold by:	SIMON & SCHUSTER
Format:	eBook
Pages:	288
Sales rank:	979,799
File size:	912 KB

About the Author

An Adams Media author.

Read an Excerpt

CHAPTER TWO

A Different Place or Time

People get angry for different reasons. Although anger is a universal feeling, its causes and expression can be culturally specific. What makes a Trobriand Islander mad is probably not going to tick off a New York City taxi driver, and the way they express their anger will be much different.
For example, a Marine once told me about a guy he knew in basic training. This young Marine had gone through extremely rigorous and nasty verbal abuse during boot camp at the hands of his Mephistophelian drill instructor. He had been insulted to the max and had been taken to the limits physically. He had not only withstood, but had succeeded fully in all the trials they could put to him. He was a "stellar" Marine. He was trained to handle the toughest physical and mental challenges out there. However, he went totally ballistic when the instructor called his mother an "old bag."
No doubt, he realized that the verbal haranguing and physical training he was undergoing was supposed to be honing him for his future job as a "devil dog." Clearly, this young man was reacting to one of the "shoulds" from his early childhood that mothers should not be insulted. He lost control and expressed his displeasure physically, resulting in the end of his military career.
Whether you agree with his reaction or not, the only caveat here is to decide if the belief (and the reaction to the situation based on that belief) works to help achieve the desired results in the situation and within the context of the society. Here is where the buck stops.
Sure, we may make some knee-jerk choices based upon that pre-ordained hard-wiring, but, thanks to our brain's frontal lobe, these decisions are normally held in check by our assumptions regarding what we consider "reasonable." Sometimes this chain of consideration and action gets thrown out of whack and problems arise when individuals take action before they decide if their situation is threatening or if their response is appropriate.
In addition, what works for dealing with perceived threats in one society in terms of rules and values may not even warrant a flicker of consideration for folks from a different place or time.

Table of Contents

CHAPTER ONE : ANGER'S TERRAIN
CHAPTER TWO: A DIFFERENT PLACE OR TIME
CHAPTER THREE : DO I FEEL?
CHAPTER FOUR: ANGER AND FAMILY VIOLENCE
CHAPTER FIVE: STRESS AND EMOTIONS
CHAPTER SIX: BURNOUT
CHAPTER SEVEN: HERE'S THE THING
CHAPTER EIGHT: COMMUNICATION AND ANGER
CHAPTER NINE: IT'S DOWN TO YOU: ASSERTIVENESS
CHAPTER TEN: CONFLICT, CONFRONTATION AND THOSE NASTY PEOPLE